Unforgiven
by Lachdannen
Summary: Entrance for August Writing Competition Prompt: Six months after the Crucible Fires, from Joker's Perspective, Destroy Ending.


Fine. You want to play this way Chambers, fine. Just know you brought this on yourself.

It's been, six months, three days since the Crucible fired. Six months, three days, and eleven hours since Commander Shepard saved the galaxy from certain annihilation. Part of me hates her for it.

Yes, I hate her. Because that's the day she killed the woman I loved. Hackett was frantic for Shepard to initiate the firing sequence. None of the rest of could do a damn thing, it was all on her. Half the fleet heard her last transmission just before the Crucibile fired, and fried every Geth, every Reaper, every artificial form of life. And EDI.

Maybe she didn't know what would happen when it went off. Maybe she did, and didn't tell anyone. Doesn't really matter I suppose. It's done, it's over, and I need to move on. Funny how that works.

It's taken them months of work, but the relays are repaired at least enough to let us travel to most of the homeworlds. Most of the old crew is gone. Good for them, I suppose, going home, going anywhere but here. I'm happy for Tali. I mean she finally has a homeworld. But part of me is too pissed off to care.. I've spent the last six months pretending, smiling, and kissing babies.

Seriously, asked to kiss a baby. Almost worth breaking a thigh to run from that nightmare.

For a while, Alliance Brass had me, Traynor, Vega, and couple of the others running around doing the whole propaganda machine thing. Traynor was cool about the whole thing. But I could tell, she didn't like doing it. Vega loved it all, soaks up the attention. I can only assume that it was drawn to him by the personal gravitational field that his towering ego generates.

That didn't last long with me. Some overly enthusiastic snot-nosed brat on Eden Prime solved the problem of me walking any time soon, when he decided to find out if Vrolik Syndrom really did mean glass bones. Little hard to do any kind of victory tour from a wheelchair. Even hackett's not a big enough asshole to make me cross rubble and construction fields in a wheelchair.

After that, I got sent back to Earth. I could still fly so, they stuck me ferrying around Admiral Stick-up-his-ass. I suppose I shouldn't complain. Hackett's not as bad as some, but being the man's chauffer irritated the hell out of me. Hackett is a stickler for protocol, rules, and regulations. I mean, he wrote most of them, back in the 18th Century. Kind of like a proud papa, you know, seeing how his ancient rules have become the laws of today? Except, you know, Hackett.

Hackett had us running from Earth to Arcturus II, pretty much on a daily basis, running me ragged. I have to give the old man credit though, he's a tough old bird. He never slept on the runs to or from the station; he always had something to do . A report about the relay repairs. A new mission for one of the Fleet. Who's breakfast he could piss in.

Eventually, even Hackett got irritated with me. I suppose one too many comments about his daughter? And he transferred me to Earth. He called it a promotion. Lieutenant Commander Jeff Moreau. I should've been happy.

But I wasn't flying. You realize that's the one thing I'm good at? I fly. I'm good at it. The Normandy … it was like a dream come true. Getting transferred off the Normandy, even under the pretense of it being repaired and the retrofit completed? Yeah, that was what finally did me in. I'd spent the better part of three years with that ship in one way or another, and the Alliance, yet again, took it away from me. For the second time?

Do you remember what I was like, when you first met me? I was angry. The frustration about killed me. Flying is who I am. And you and Cerberus gave it back to me. Okay, fine, the Illusive Man turned out to be a sociopathic, evil mastermind bent on world domination, but at the time he did some good. And then the alliance took it all away. And me? Well, I had to smile while they did it, didn't I?

I spent about three weeks doing that job; running the training with latest batch of pilots, which wasn't so bad in some ways. Except for a few things. One of those? I had to walk by the statue of the Commander who killed EDI.

And I know what you are going to say, that EDI wasn't a person. That she was a machine, an AI that learned and adapted to our responses. Heuristic Learning Algorithms or some bullshit. But you weren't there the last year, those six months before the Reaper Invasion. You weren't there for those missions. Palaven ... Tuchanka ... god Chambers, nothing could have prepared us for that. I saw what she became, how she felt. She lived.I don't care what everyone said, she lived, loved, thought...She lived Kelly, and she loved me. Seeing that statue every day? Walking under the shadow of the Commander that I respected, whos' body count reached to the millions? More than I could stand.

So, I put in my resignation. Liara, the sneaky blue busy-body that she is got word of it of course. I think she's been reading my emails. Hell, she's probably reading this. Liara, if I find out that you cameras following my every move, I'll kick your ass, even if I have to break both my legs to do it

She came to visit though, nearly the same day I put the damn thing on Hackett's desk. She tried to talk me out of it. I don't know how, maybe she did some crazy blacked-eyed 'Embrace eternity' thing on me, but somehow she got me to agree to stay; apparently to get 'therapy.' Which brings us back to you.

I'm not sure what you wanted from this, Kelly. I hate this psychological bullshit. I've never been wild about the idea of people analyzing me, or trying to guess what I'm going to do. Frankly, it's fun to watch you squirm as you try and figure just what Crazy Joker is going to do next.

So listen to this Chambers. I'm a bit crazy. I have been for a while. Nothing you say or do will tell me that Shepard, the same Shepard who'd beaten all the odds before this, couldn't have found a way to save her. I watched that woman walk where even angels feared to tread. And you know what? She smiled while she did it. So as irrational as it is, yes, I hate her.

Six months, three days, and … twelve hours now. Some things can't just can't forgiven or forgetten. So fuck you Chambers, and fuck your little therapy session. This is the Jeff Moreau that you're stuck with.

* * *

_**Author Note: **So, a HUGE thank you to MizDirected and __Lady Amiee Krios_ for betaing this for me, and helping me hammer this into something that won't make your eyes bleed with the number of adverbs, was's and weres. The words "die was die" are now forever engrained in my mind. They are both awesome.


End file.
